


Precise Instruments

by stephanericher



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-21 21:56:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13152825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stephanericher/pseuds/stephanericher
Summary: [tlj spoilers] Hux’s voice curls into the air like thin smoke from a campfire, distinct and stark against the non-atmosphere that is the inside of the ship.





	Precise Instruments

A military as large as the First Order’s takes skill and precision to manage, at least by traditional wisdom. Ren happens to believe that traditional wisdom is shit in this regard, and if he were in charge of the military he’d run it a little differently, with a little more straightforward fear and a little less micromanagement. Technically, as Supreme Leader of what’s effectively a military dictatorship, Ren is in charge, but as the whole thing hasn’t imploded he’ll just leave it to Hux. It’s more effective to make suggestions and have Hux give him the look that mentally screams “Supreme Leader, are you an idiot?” and get him worked up, because truthfully Hux is much more of a priority than the fucking troops and military strategies and lower-ranking officers chafing at their leashes.

But when Hux gives him that look, Ren also wants to strangle him, pull at his mind, make him keep his damn hands off for just a second and let the military, bolstered and trained and focused, stand on its own. Hux likes to think he knows better, but how could he? Years of strategy games and a few of actual military experience that he has on Ren? It’s laughable, really, but Ren doesn’t laugh. He lets it go, insubordination that Snoke never would have tolerated and that Ren isn’t exactly tolerating here, but—things are different now. They’d all do well to remember that. Ren has a galaxy to run now, and Hux has a navy of a slightly different shape, smaller enough for him to feel he should concentrate his paranoia, pretend it’s bringing him somewhere closer to satisfaction, though they both know he’ll never be satisfied even after they’ve absorbed the last remnants of the New Republic and crushed the Resistance and any of its remnants.

How tense would Hux get, following a direct order to the contrary? It’s an interesting thought, Hux’s instincts honed since early childhood, the weight of responsibility he holds on his shoulders, so obviously pretending it’s not there, chafing against inactivity and time. The ideas of the Jedi, as useless as they are tied up in a package, have some merit—meditating, specifically, opening one’s self to the Force, not doing something to look like you’re busy. Not that it’s really a Jedi thing, more a general people-who-aren’t-Hux thing. Ren’s mouth quirks upward, and it would be nice if Hux could see him right now.

It is not something he can gaze at the sky and imagine doing (that’s trite; that’s something for fools); it’s even more within reach now that he’s the Supreme Leader. This is his bridge; these are his soldiers in the middle of a shift change, murmuring things to one another as they get up and sit down. This is a streamlined machine, even if its flaws are apparent, the cracks slow to seal themselves. One of them notices him standing in the doorway and the flow changes, tension, stutters, glances quick and obvious. The kind of power that Hux craves, though with perhaps a different result, but that Ren does not particularly concern himself with. What are all these interchangeable parts, after all? It’s not as if Hux wishes to know them, advance their military careers (or even particularly stop any of them); it’s just—Ren’s spared them too much thought, spared all of this too much thought. That much is aggravating, and he makes a noise in the back of his throat. That Hux notices, a sharp turn and then, Ren feels the acknowledgement, the feeling of liquid metal cooling around the edges, still molten but the glow a little less sharp. His attention returns to the blur of Hyperspace outside, and then to the datapad in his hands. The crew follows his lead; even as Ren walks down to meet him the space feels as if it’s falling back into the baseline.

Ren waits.

“Supreme Leader.”

Hux’s voice curls into the air like thin smoke from a campfire, distinct and stark against the non-atmosphere that is the inside of the ship.

It would be impractical to do anything here, to touch Hux. Not to move closer, so Ren does, but to grip his hand, the small of his back, brush the seam of his glove across Hux’s face. He’s done things Hux might consider far worse, and Hux’s perfect façade gets more warped the more Ren looks at it, and yet. Here, the cold steel, the remnants of the old Empire at their clearest and most concentrated, the ship headed toward the Outer Rim, the odds in their favor (how much, Ren can’t say, only enough of a feeling in the Force and a concurrence from Hux’s calculations, a rare synergy).

Hux steps forward; his boots are careful and precise on the floor, sharp. Ren feels a flash of annoyance, pricking him like a desert plant he’d accidentally brushed up against. His lip curls; he turns. Hux’s attention follows him, but not the turn of his head. Ren grits his teeth; the walk back to his chambers feels unnecessarily far.

He’s never attempted to contact the girl through hyperspace, but that doesn’t mean it’s got less of a chance of working than when the ship is cruising through space and he is searching, opening his mind, breathing—it should be easy. The connection didn’t die with Snoke, and yet, it’s as if she’s disconnected it and cut the transmission, scrambled her own signal. She’ll want to find him again; if there’s one thing Ren knows about people like her it’s that they romanticize sinking in their teeth, attempting the same thing over again. Ren thinks, very briefly, of Hux, of how he has five things going on, a forward route and a backward route and one hand pointing the blaster, the other on the detonator in his belt. Sometimes he ends up hitting himself with the shrapnel, standing too close to what he’s confident he won’t have to use. He’s easier to think about, whichever way, than this, the Resistance and their tiny can-you-still-call-it-a-fleet. Ren sets his jaw again; he is not thinking about Han Solo’s face, Skywalker’s irritating voice. He thinks about how much time there is until Hux is due to give his report.

He always refuses to kneel, and there was a time when Ren would force him, slow enough to give him the idea that he could struggle, watching him writhe and strain, nearly pop his kneecap. But that’s since stopped being fun, especially when Ren can watch him approach the throne, keep his eyes on Hux’s, wait for the slightest flicker that’s never there, until he gets too close.

“General. What is it?”

(Truthfully, Ren cares little for this report; it’s not as if anything noteworthy can be found while they’re barreling through the galaxy, and it’s not as if there’s any of the usual smugness in Hux’s face or Force presence that comes with taking credit for someone else’s discovery.) It’s Hux who gets the closest here, as if he thinks he’s getting even for Ren being in the territory he considers his, or as if he’s telling Ren to watch the throne. Cute, as he so rarely is, if insubordinate. Ren steps back, halfway; there are still mere centimeters between their mouths, and Hux does not falter, and then.

“Then I’ll be taking my leave. Supreme Leader.” A nod, a motion to begin a turn, and Ren grabs his arm.

Hux lets Ren pull him in, as if it was his plan all along (hardly likely). He tastes of his mid-afternoon cup of caf, still, of the barely-still-begrudging enjoyment pressing up against his chest. Like a small victory, from Ren’s point of view.

**Author's Note:**

> whats up with tlj not having a fandom tag yet is that just not a thing people are doing
> 
> also im only like 89% sure they use metric in sw


End file.
